My Most Precious Human
Chapter 13

The rest of the evaluation proceeded in silence. All the caged girls were trembling in fear, and those whose blood was examined prayed that they would prove themselves worthy to be placed at this cruel auction.

I kept clenching my teeth and fists. Anger overflowed from every cell in my body.

"This isn't right! We are not some merchandise they can sell or throw away if something is below their expectations!" I fumed inside my head.

I could smell the stink of blood slowly drying on the basement ground. It was nauseating and horrifying at the same time. I couldn't stop thinking of the girl's last words, and about her daughter who would grow up without her mother. The sound of her pleading voice rang inside my head. She was ill, but she wanted to live. She had chances to prolong her life. She deserved to live! What kind of monsters would do something like that?! Even the wolves I met had never been this calculated and cruel!

I was full of rage on the inside, but on the outside, I had to stay focused. I took a deep breath and leaned out through the bars of my cage to see what was going on. There were only four of us left to get a price tag. The expert had finished sniffing the drop of blood of girl number sixteen and nonchalantly announced that her life was worth ten thousand dollars. The next one was Carla...

Mr. Ponte looked her up and down and smirked coldly. She hesitantly pulled out her hand. Her whole body shivered with fear, and she seemed to be much more frightened than those girls before her. Could it be that she was ill, like the one who had leukemia?!

"No..." I mumbled, praying that my suspicions were wrong.

I could see Carla shut her eyes when Mr. Ponte stabbed her finger with a needle. The blood started flowing. A trickle coming from the small cut was quite intense and the blood just kept flowing. I already knew why she was so afraid...

"Hemophilia!" Mr. Ponte announced loudly.

This one word could easily mean a death sentence. By now, everyone must have been aware of it, yet none of the girls dared to make a single sound.

"Such a shame..." Thomas commented, clicking his tongue, and burst out laughing, "She's nothing but a one-time snack!"

All the other men in the room began laughing as well. They mocked her while she moved to the back of her cage, glancing hesitantly at them.

Suddenly, Thomas stopped laughing, then looked at Nicolas and said, "You know what to do."

Nicolas nodded and pulled out the gun.

"No! Don't kill her! I'm begging you!" I screamed.

I was the only one who spoke up. Everyone else stayed silent. Thomas looked at me and snorted. Nicolas walked to Carla's cage and aimed at her head while she kneeled and closed her eyes. A sudden rage filled my entire body. I clenched my fists on the cage's bars as if I had the strength to break them. I glared at the one holding the gun, gritting my teeth.

"I'm going to kill you! I swear I will get out of this cage and kill you!" I roared, devoured by fury.

Thomas chuckled and then held his previous command with a gesture. Nicolas lowered his gun. I glanced at both of them nervously. Thomas stepped closer to my cage.

"You are a fierce one, aren't you? I bet you are that Queen of Hearts I was told about, the little fighter," he sneered, then disgustingly licked his lips.

"Yes... I was the one wearing that costume. So what?" I hissed, looking into his eyes.

He smiled coldly and said, "I have a proposition for you. Let's make a little bet, shall we? Our expert examines your blood, and if it is shown to be more valuable than all the other blood bags here, we will generously let Carla live a little longer. We will add her as a free gift to the one who buys you."

I clenched my teeth. I had never wanted to kill anyone more than I wanted to kill that man at that moment. At the same time, Mr. Ponte finished examining another girl's blood, and he called out her price completely emotionlessly.

"What will happen... if I'm not worth that much?" I asked, giving Thomas a hateful stare.

"Oh, nothing much... We will simply shoot both of you." He shrugged his shoulders and maliciously chuckled.

I smirked and pulled out my hand through the bar cages. At the same time, I imagined that the hand that I pulled out grabbed his neck, so I could stab my nails into his throat. Unfortunately, for now, I was the one being stabbed...

Mr. Ponte saw the drop of my blood and instantly flinched. I gazed at him curiously. He looked into my eyes, then he glanced at the cut on my finger again.

"T-that's impossible..." he muttered, then carefully touched the drop with his finger.

His hands started to tremble as he watched his finger being painted in my blood, then he burst out laughing like a madman.

"Mr. Ponte?" Thomas called, obviously disturbed by the expert's weird behavior.

"Such... an aroma..." Mr. Ponte mumbled, sniffing my blood on his hand.

"Mr. Ponte!" Thomas roared, "The price! What's her starting price?!"

"At least five hundred thousand dollars!" he exclaimed, laughing hysterically, "she is a one-of-a-kind treasure!"

Thomas laughed viciously, then sighed, looking at me with a cold grin.

"It looks like we will have to let your friend live a little longer," he stated, then walked closer and leaned over me. "Let's hope that the expert is right. Bring us a lot of money and don't let me regret saving a meaningless life."

"Her life isn't meaningless!" I squeezed through my clenched teeth.

Thomas snorted wickedly, then ignored me, and nodded towards his men. They rushed to attach chains on the top of each cage. Then they used a hoist to move the first cage onto a platform. "What is that?" I asked nervously.

"That, my dear, is something that will lift you up on the stage," Thomas explained and hurriedly corrected his jacket, "Now if you excuse me, I need to go. The auction is about to begin..."

He turned around and walked out of the room while his evil laughter echoed in the air. I clenched the bars of my cage, realizing there was no way I could possibly escape, but still unwilling to proclaim my surrender.

The cages were going up one by one, and all I could do was sit and wait to be sold. I had never felt this helpless and defenseless, even while growing up at the orphanage. Every time that the cage was going down, I could hear a painful lament of the one who was inside the cage. The cry was then drowned with the wicked, mocking laughter of those who stood there as our prison guards.

"Congrats!" I heard them call towards the ones who were sold, "Be sure to serve your new masters well! Don't let them suck you dry at their first meal!"

Afterwards, those sold were dragged out of the cage and led in some unknown direction. Carla was also taken away since she was supposed to be merely a gift from the auction house. "Where are you taking her?!" I shouted, watching her disappear behind some big, metal door.

"We're taking her into a waiting room. Don't worry, you will find out soon enough by yourself," one of the guards said, sneering at me.

Finally, it was my turn. My cage was placed on the platform. I looked up and saw a hatch above the cage open. Then the platform went up and I found myself in the middle of the grand stage of a casino theatre. My heart pounded hectically while my whole body shivered. I looked around. The audience was full. Everyone was wearing a mask, just like at the banquet. I could bet that these were exactly the same people. They were all chuckling and enjoying themselves while watching the girls, their innocent victims, tremble in fear. They were disgusting.

Suddenly, I saw an auctioneer leaning over my cage. He also wore a mask. He looked at me intensively, licked his lips, then turned towards the audience.

"As our last item, we have prepared a rare delicacy! Even I can barely resist marking her while standing next to her! Our expert claims that she is like one in the million or billion even!" he called out while grinning. "We will start our bidding at five hundred thousand dollars..."

I gulped.

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